Luke 13:4 - Ellicott's Commentary On The Whole Bible

Upon whom the tower in Siloam fell. — Here, again, we have a reference to an incident not recorded elsewhere. It was clearly one that had impressed the minds of men with horror, as a special judgment. At or near to Siloam, the modern Birket-Silwan, is a swimming-pool, or tank (John 9:7), where the valley of Tyropœon opens into that of the Kedron. It was supplied through artificial conduits, and appears to have been one of a series of pools so fed. It is not unlikely, connected as Siloam thus was with the water-system of the city, that the tower in question was part of the works which Pilate had planned, and partly executed, for the construction of an aqueduct, and for which he appropriated part of the Corban or sacred treasure of the Temple, and if so, the popular excitement which this measure caused (see Note on Matthew 27:2) might well lead men to look on its fall as an instance of a divine judgment on what they regarded as an act of sacrilege.